Party prep

I'm so nervous I can't sleep.
I think I have everything ready for Van's birthday tomorrow.

Here is the plan:
CrossFit before anyone wakes up (5:30 - 7)
Make crepes for breakfast as babies wake up (7-8)
Bake cupcakes with Van for his class (8-9:30)
Head to bouncing bears at (9:30 - 12)
Take Van to preschool (12:30)
Put Esther down for a nap (1:00)
Pick Van up from preschool... (3:00)

Party! (4:00 - 6:30)
Including the following:
 - decorate a Christmas Tree (4:00 - 4:45)

 I got decorations at Micheal's, all 60% off :)

 

 - 4-wheeler rides and roast hotdogs around the fire in Svea's yard (4:45 - 5:30)

 -  Eat cake and ice cream, open presents, play (5:30 - 6:15)

Play with Lunoes (6:30 - 8:00)

Go to bed! (8:30)

Sunday

Sunday was busy!
First we went to Kincaid and tried out Van's new skies again. He did awesome.

 Esther stood on her skis a little. But mostly she ran around.

Intermittently I fed them 2-3 semi-sweet chocolate chips, just to keep them motivated. This was one such chocolate chip break.

After all that hard work we needed some real food so we got burritos at Qdoba

Van shared with Esther which was nice.

Then we went sledding for Clem's 6th Birthday party! The party was at Russian Jack; it was great.

Elin and I taking a break

Van contemplating his next run.

I don't have a picture of us, but Solvej and I were excellent sledding buddies. We probably did 7 or 8 runs together. She said she wants to go with me if we go sledding again.

Clem and kids eating birthday snacks.

Then we walked over to Svea's in the evening. Esther in her cloak.

Esther swinging on the trapeze.

Esther on Skis

I finally bought Van a real pair of skis with ski boots. So we gave his old pair to Esther.

We all went out skiing last night, Andy took Van ahead and Esther and I hung out.


I love this first picture, I crouched down to take her picture so she crouched down too.

I had to stand up to get a picture of her standing up.

 

Here's a little movie

Christmas Play

Van had his Christmas play at preschool.

He got some McNuggets as a treat.

Favorite Number

Van and I talked about numbers the other day.
He had me write numbers 1 to 100 and we talked about infinity and going from 1 to 1,000,000,000 by multiplying by ten. I don't know if any of it sank in, but ultimately he wanted to know which number was my favorite.
Which is of course
0.142857

I found this awesome number doing my Statics homework
            ______
1/7 = 0.142857

Which by itself was cool because 1428 was part of my phone number growing up.

But then I figured out that 2/7, 3/7, 4/7, 5/7 and 6/7 are all a version of this repeating number, just starting at a different place.

2/7 = 0.2857142857142
3/7 = 0.4285714285714
4/7 = 0.5714285714285
5/7 = 0.7142857142857
6/7 = 0.8571428571428

Which was the greatest thing I had ever seen. Then a quick search will tell you that people have figured out even more cool things about the number.

http://www.decisionsciencenews.com/2013/07/10/numbers-worth-knowing-142857/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/142857_%28number%29

I don't know what's going on there, but I like it.

Pre-School Picture compare

One year comparison. An almost 4 year old compared to an almost 5 year old.
Both very handsome.

ConocoPhillips Holiday Party - Kids

ConocoPhillips has a party for families each year. It is great, but it has never been a good fit for us because it requires waiting in line; something Van has never been able to do. Until now.
Usually we just run through the crowd and Van asks to ride the elevators up and down.
But this year we did everything.

First we waited in line for Santa. The line is always long so I've never tried before, but this time Van was committed. We wrote a list while waiting in line.

What kind of sled does he want?
'A fast one.
Maybe with some rockets on the side.'

Talking the list over with Santa.

Then on to the next item; he did a craft while I waited in line for him to get some balloon art.

 He worked hard and made a cool ornament.

Then he got his face painted. He asked for 'Pirate Face' which wasn't on the list so I wasn't sure what he would get, but she came up with something great.

 Then we got to go on a sleigh ride around the block.

I think the horses names were Dan and Bill

 What fun!